SS OU Double Rill

[SLDR]

Importable

Hello everyone! Merry Christmas! Thanks for opening this RMT. This team features many regular OU Pokémon and a little bit of an odd pick: Azumarill. The inspiration for this team is many videos I've seen on YouTube of creators using Wishiwashi or Altaria with trapping moves and Soak/Toxic and Perish Song respectively. I've looked up at the mons that learn PerishSong and either Whirlpool or Fire Spin and I found Azumarill to be the best one. Also Primarina learns them, but there is a major difference between Azumarill and Primarina: Azumarill can be immune to Grass moves (and also it's physically bulkier). Furthermore, Azumarill is pretty notorious as a powerful physical attacker, so this also surprises people.

​

TEAM BUILDING PROCESS

This is how the team started: physically defensive Perish Trap Azumarill and CB Rillaboom. Why Rillaboom? First of all, Azumarill is very efficient at trapping any Ferrothorn and/or Toxapex (or Tangrowth for that matter). I've also trapped quite a few Clefables lacking Teleport. This Azumarill also conveniently stone walls opposing Rillabooms and can catch an unsuspecting choiced Kartana locking Leaf Blade completely off guard. Removing all of these threats allows for Rillaboom to more easily work his way through a Grassy Glide win. Rillaboom also comes in with a very useful Grassy Terrain that can keep Azumarill healthy alongside Leftovers and Protect.

At this point this core was looking nice against some Rain teams but it's blatantly obvious that Zapdos would be tearing through it. Also Poison types attackers like Slowking-G were looking dangerous. Kyurem was also a bit concerning due to Freeze Dry. Since Azu is somewhat decent at checking Urshifu, I figured I could go Tyranitar to have Stealth Rock support, Spectrier check, Zapdos and Moltres switch in. With Tyranitar comes in Excadrill, who acts as a very interesting secondary win condition, but also helps Rillaboom by luring in the birds and smacking them with Swords Dance + Rock Slide.

Moltres itself makes an appearance on this team, initially as a physically defensive back up because... reasons? I don't know why honestly, I started to have problems with Nidoking and Tapu Lele so I made is more specially defensive and it worked better. It's a nice backbone to the team, checks the demon Heatran and that STAB Fire is really helpful because you can't always rely on Azumarill and certain mons require it. Also Mystical Fire helps containing the demon Magearna or any special attacker for that matter.

Latios entered the team for no particular reason other than it appreciates Ferrothorn being removed from the opposing team. I went with Soul Dew to bolster my special defense as well and because it provides a recoil-free boost to it's STAB moves, which is very helpful when you're also taking Sandstorm chip damage and not benefitting from Grassy Terrain.

TEAM IN DEPTH

Azumarill @ Leftovers
Ability: Sap Sipper
EVs: 248 HP / 252 Def / 4 SpA / 4 SpD
Bold Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Whirlpool
- Perish Song
- Protect
- Draining Kiss

Conceptually, this is the core of the team. It's the one mon I'm not willing to change. It has the bulk to win the 1v1 against the demon Urshifu, plus it's typing allows Azu to provide a decent defensive utility (living 2 CB Liquidation from Barraskewda in Rain may prove to be useful), despite being used with suck a whacky set. Whirlpool is a decent move to spam when you don't know what to do because it eases prediction and gets decent chip damage, especially if you can afford a Protect. Overall, this is a very gimmicky set that doesn't always work, but Azumarill can pull it off while being useful as a standalone defensive presence. Also, Azu would be a very nice mon against an opponent who's down to one Pokémon, but this thing doesn't offer much towards the late game, it usually works well as a well-timed sack. Perish Song also immediately stops any Magearna trying to set up and this actually happened to be a handful of times so it's worth noting. Azumarill does its job.

Urshifu Calcs

4 SpA Azumarill Draining Kiss vs. 0 HP / 0 SpD Urshifu: 220-264 (64.5 - 77.4%) -- guaranteed 2HKO. 40.9 - 49.1% recovered

252 Atk Choice Band Urshifu Poison Jab vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Azumarill: 218-258 (54 - 64%) -- guaranteed 2HKO

+1 252+ Atk Life Orb Urshifu Poison Jab vs. 248 HP / 252+ Def Azumarill: 309-367 (76.6 - 91%)

Rillaboom @ Choice Band
Ability: Grassy Surge
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Adamant Nature
- Grassy Glide
- Wood Hammer
- Knock Off
- High Horsepower

Since Grassy Surge got released, this mon became a mainstay of SS OU. This is not the first time you see this thing so you know what it does. Band offers immediate power and a massive boon in both its Grass STAB, one for breaking purposes and the other for revenge killing or late game cleaning. This mon is so good yet so balanced in this metagame. If you support it well, you will be pleasantly rewarded and while this is true for every Pokémon out there, Rillaboom in extremely threatening to begin with. High Horsepower is the 4th slot because Azu removes the need for Superpower and it's nice to have for certain Steel and Poison types.


Tyranitar @ Leftovers
Ability: Sand Stream
EVs: 248 HP / 8 Atk / 252 SpD
Careful Nature
- Stealth Rock
- Rock Blast
- Crunch
- Superpower

Easy pick for this team, does pretty well in the meta although it invites Urshifu in. This is why it runs Superpower in the last slot. Urshifu and Spectrier are amazing partners, so having a Spectrier counter that can lure in and deal 65%-77% + sand to Urshifu on the switch is pretty neat. This Godzilla dinosaur is here to put the birds, the moth and the horse in check, messing with opposing weather strategies and providing SR support. Crunch hits Slowking-G, Slowking and Slowbro hard, while Rock Blast is a pretty nice STAB move.


Excadrill @ Lum Berry
Ability: Sand Rush
EVs: 252 Atk / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Jolly Nature
- High Horsepower
- Iron Head
- Rock Slide
- Swords Dance

Tyranitar's best friend. Unfortunately I have to use High Horsepower, but this is nevertheless a great pick for this team. Emergency speed control, good breaking power, nice lure for birds with Lum Berry as a safety net against miscellaneous Scalds, Flame Body and Static bs. Again, I have to write 3 lines but you know what Excadrill does. Amazing typing, power, movepool, ability. This thing will always be good. I'm tempted by Shuca Berry since Garchomp is pretty worrysome, but this is something that needs to be tested. For now, I've managed against Garchomp.


Moltres @ Heavy-Duty Boots
Ability: Flame Body
EVs: 248 HP / 48 Def / 212 SpD
Calm Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Mystical Fire
- Scorching Sands
- Roost
- Defog

The fiery chicken makes an appearance on this team, keeping it together against miscellaneous threats, from Grass types, to Magearna, to Heatran, to Scarf Lele to any physical attacker that has to pray the gods of this game to be in the 70% rather than the 30%. This thing has some bulk to it, while being very useful when attacking, either reducing the opponent's special attack or causing burns. Defog keeps the field clear by hazards, Flame Body deters Knock Off as much as possible, while Roost keep it healthy.


Latios (M) @ Soul Dew
Ability: Levitate
EVs: 252 SpA / 4 SpD / 252 Spe
Timid Nature
IVs: 0 Atk
- Draco Meteor
- Psychic
- Roost
- Substitute

This is kinda the odd ball in this team, but it has been quite useful. Soul Dew is the perfect item for this set, as I only use STAB. Reason one: Ferrothorn is getting trapped. Reason 2: Heatran doesn't like any other member of my team. Reason 3: Urshifu is too broken and I need Substitute to play mindgames with its Sucker Punches, or my team gets annihilated by Bulk Up - Sucker Punch sets. Psyshock might be useful here, it's up to preference. This set works surprisingly well with a dedicated trapper, firing off strong moves safely behind a Sub is very useful. This one might actually be better suited as an Heatran partner since they also cover their weakness magnificiently, but Azu is still good to have (and you can fit also Heatran on this team to be fair if you tweak it a little bit - imagine a double trapping core like that)​

CONCLUSION
This team is unpolished, Azumarill can be either amazing or meh, Urshifu can still destroy this team, Garchomp is a threat and a half (thank god Scale Shot reduces defense so that Rillaboom has an easier time), sometimes Moltres and Latios feels like they almost don't belong here, and it also seems there isn't a clear win condition here. Nevertheless, this team is pretty fun to play, has some cool little strategies (basically all of them are at least in part to combat Urshifu lol ban that thing asap) and that Azumarill set is definitely gimmicky, but very usable and catches people off guard tremendously. Whirlpool, Stealth Rock and Sandstorm get chip damage suprisingly easily... until Grassy Terrain kicks in, but that's worth it. Let me know what do you think of this team, this rather quick attempt at making quirky sets work in quite the unforgiving enviroinment that is competitive Pokémon battling.

 

[Batzi]

I feel like if you were to remove one pokemon from this team I'd be Latios and as you said, Urshifu is a tough matchup even with defensive Azumarill. As odd as a choice this may be, I'd consider Buzzwole>Latios. It's hard to think of pokemon to fit in that slot where I wouldn't double up on types that share similar weaknesses (what I mean by this is Ferro and Heatran work well because of Flash Fire or Corv and Ferro who are neutral to or resist each others weaknesses bar Fire). So I thought something like Pex could fit in the last slot but Azu shares similar defensive traits with it. I considered Corviknight too. Issue with those of these too is that then your team is very vulnerable to electric. I also thought about replacing Moltres with Corv and Latios with Heatran but that makes the Shifu matchup worse because Moltres can do decent due to Flame Body chance. One other thing to consider, with Azu are your defensive check to Shifu, you're revealing that you're bulky Azu and not offensive. So yeah I'd highly consider Buzzwole here. Drain Punch/Toxic (or Bulk Up)/Ice Punch/Roost. The EV Spread would be 252HP/152Def/104Spe with an Impish Nature. The speed helps outspeed Modest Magnezone.

Apart from the glaring Shifu weakness, this is a really well built team, good job!

 

[SLDR]

I feel like if you were to remove one pokemon from this team I'd be Latios and as you said, Urshifu is a tough matchup even with defensive Azumarill. As odd as a choice this may be, I'd consider Buzzwole>Latios. It's hard to think of pokemon to fit in that slot where I wouldn't double up on types that share similar weaknesses (what I mean by this is Ferro and Heatran work well because of Flash Fire or Corv and Ferro who are neutral to or resist each others weaknesses bar Fire). So I thought something like Pex could fit in the last slot but Azu shares similar defensive traits with it. I considered Corviknight too. Issue with those of these too is that then your team is very vulnerable to electric. I also thought about replacing Moltres with Corv and Latios with Heatran but that makes the Shifu matchup worse because Moltres can do decent due to Flame Body chance. One other thing to consider, with Azu are your defensive check to Shifu, you're revealing that you're bulky Azu and not offensive. So yeah I'd highly consider Buzzwole here. Drain Punch/Toxic (or Bulk Up)/Ice Punch/Roost. The EV Spread would be 252HP/152Def/104Spe with an Impish Nature. The speed helps outspeed Modest Magnezone.

Apart from the glaring Shifu weakness, this is a really well built team, good job!

That's a very good suggestion! Thank you! With Toxic I can lure in and cripple the birds as well, plus I get to run a better move than Superpower in the last slot for Tyranitar - maybe one of Toxic, Thunder Wave, Fire Blast, Ice Beam. I'll play around with those.

Also, with Buzzwole, the spread on Moltres changes because it no longer has to survive 2 Urshifu Close Combats. I would run 248 HP / 240 SpD / 20 Spe. With this spread, Moltres lives two Sludge Waves from Timid Nidoking while outspeeding Magnezone and Buzzwole EV'd to outspeed Magnezone.

This is what the team now looks like

 

[Batzi]

That's a very good suggestion! Thank you! With Toxic I can lure in and cripple the birds as well, plus I get to run a better move than Superpower in the last slot for Tyranitar - maybe one of Toxic, Thunder Wave, Fire Blast, Ice Beam. I'll play around with those.

Also, with Buzzwole, the spread on Moltres changes because it no longer has to survive 2 Urshifu Close Combats. I would run 248 HP / 240 SpD / 20 Spe. With this spread, Moltres lives two Sludge Waves from Timid Nidoking while outspeeding Magnezone and Buzzwole EV'd to outspeed Magnezone.

This is what the team now looks like

Glad I could help bro :)
If possible keep me updated on how the team goes!

 

[curiosity]

Hey man, this is a really solid team! I've been playing around with whirl azu for a while, so it was a really fun experience to give this team a spin. That being said, I couldn't help but notice that there were a few pretty big issues with the team. I'm not going to cover what you've already mentioned, but I did want to touch on the fact there's a few slots that generally felt redundant - I generally found both Moltres and Latios unnecessary in the sense that both had a lot of their defensive niches already covered by the rest of the team, but also just a bit unreliable in general? I never really found myself actively seeking out Moltres in particular since stuff Azumarill and Tyranitar basically covered everything barring Melmetal off defensively and Latios was just a bit too weak to properly fulfill that strong breaker slot that's necessary on this sort of sand balance - and while we're on the topic of balance, this team just struggles versus balance mostly because you're not really able to reliably break past a lot of the sturdier mons such as Skarmory, Buzzwole, and Sludge Tangrowth without having to resort to misplays given that relies too heavily on Rrillaboom + Excadrill to pressure these builds, which I don't really think is ideal given that you are working with a build that generally needs to keep up the offensive pressure against opposing balances.

Last thing I'll say about this build is that I really dislike how slow the team is; it's not a dealbreaker by any means given that you've got enough speed control, but I personally prefer having the immediate options vs generally fast mons like Tapu Koko, Spectrier, and Cinderace. without relying too heavily on one mon to pressure them offensively for reliability's sake but again, that's just personal preference. That aside, this is how I've used your team:

>

Like I've said, I really didn't find Moltres particularly useful on this build, so I ended up replacing it with Buzzwole given that it covered off the huge Urshifu and SD Grounds weakness, but it also covers off on basically everything that Moltres checked, minus Heatran and Magearna arguably a lot more reliably - Ferrothorn, Rillaboom, and Kartana can't make progress as easily, while SD Bulu and Zarude can't really make progress whatsoever. It also helps just generally having a backup check to a lot of the bigger rain threats such as Barraskewda, Crawdaunt, and Rapid Strike to a lesser extent, given that it takes a lot of pressure off of Azumarill, which can also be easily abused by stuff like BU Rapid Strike and SD Crawdaunt anyways, so it's just generally nice to have that secondary option. I've gone with Toxic here given that you're able to punish really greedy Slowbro, Zapdos, and Moltres which generally want to pivot into Buzzwole, but it can also be used to lure in Clefable and Mandibuzz to be punished by....

>

Dragapult, which coincidentally happens to solve two of the team's biggest issues: lack of natural speed and an alternative measure to pressure the top-heavy mons that check both Excadrill and Rillaboom - and on that note, it removes a lot of pressure from both as it gives you a reliable method to revenge kill Spectrier and Cinderace. Dragapult's synergy with the two mons goes beyond that: you're also able to pressure shared checks to the offensive duo in Mandibuzz, Tapu Fini, and Zarude which also naturally just opens up a lot of opportunities for both mons to easily clean. Similarly, it also adds some solid defensive options to the team, as it's able to pivot into AV Glowking with Future Sight and can even afford to pivot into Moltres, Zapdos and Cinderace if it's healthy. Now I should probably explain the oddly specific EVs: the HP and Defence investment allows Dragapult to live an Adamant Cinderace Sucker Punch from full, avoid the 2hko from Rillaboom's Grassy Glide from full, and survive a Clefable / Tapu Fini's Moonblast after a round of Stealth Rock damage. I've also opted to run Thunder in the paste as it 2hko's Mandibuzz, Corviknight, and Tapu Fini, but you're more than welcome to run Shadow Ball if you want a consistent damage option + a move to ohko Spectrier with.


As for some smaller changes, I'd recommend running Leftovers on Excadrill, given that you're able to come in and constantly abuse Clefable and actually afford to pivot into Magearna without remaining low throughout the remainder of the game. I've also opted to run Rock Slide + Rapid Spin on Excadrill as you're able to punish a lot of your shared checks w/ Rillaboom's in Mandibuzz, Zapdos, and Moltres which just saves you a considerable amount of hassle w/ contact moves. Rillaboom now rocks U-turn over Stomping Tantrum as Tantrum was unnecessary and giving mons free turns is much more beneficial in general. Lastly, Tyranitar now runs Rock Blast / Earthquake / Thunder Wave alongside 40 speed EVs, as Earthquake hits Melmetal, Heatran, and Glowking in the one slot, while Thunder Wave is generally nice to run alongside basically, as you can effectively cripple Clefable, Corviknight, and Urshifu to be taken advantage of by the rest of the team. While this isn't in the import, Knock Off and Toxic are both solid options over Draining Kiss which isn't as necessary now the team has an alternative Urshifu check although that didn't really stop me from using Draining Kiss anyways since it's actually pretty funny to watch, but again, it's entirely up to you.



importable


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>

Let me preface this now: this is an entirely optional change (as optional as a suggestion can be ) but I personally enjoyed running Tornadus as an option over Rillaboom. As I've mentioned earlier, I personally preferred having a generally faster team since it makes playing around offensive mons like Urshifu, Rillaboom, Kartana, and Cinderace a lot more manageable, but again, that's entirely a personal thing for me. That aside, I personally enjoyed having the ability to forcibly remove Zapdos without having to worry about Static contact or being able to break past Corviknight without having to flinch your way through it, although it does come at the cost of the absurdly good rain matchup. If you're concerned about the consequences of losing Rillaboom and how that affects Azumarill, after around 5-6 games of playing without it, I can still say it's absolutely huge given that you're able to trap quite a lot of mons (I ended up forcibly trapping a cm spectrier, tapu fini, melmetal, and a specs kyurem while using the torn version) that benefit the entire team so I can assure you the original idea is still in tact, but I hope you give it a try anyways.


alternate importable

=====

And that should cover just about everything, although I should probably give you a fare warning that I've made the Melmetal matchup considerably more difficult, but it should be manageable! If you have any questions, feel free to pm me on the forums or on discord @ curi#3022 and I'd be happy to answer them. Have a happy holidays and a safe new year.

 

[SLDR]

Hey man, this is a really solid team! I've been playing around with whirl azu for a while, so it was a really fun experience to give this team a spin. That being said, I couldn't help but notice that there were a few pretty big issues with the team. I'm not going to cover what you've already mentioned, but I did want to touch on the fact there's a few slots that generally felt redundant - I generally found both Moltres and Latios unnecessary in the sense that both had a lot of their defensive niches already covered by the rest of the team, but also just a bit unreliable in general? I never really found myself actively seeking out Moltres in particular since stuff Azumarill and Tyranitar basically covered everything barring Melmetal off defensively and Latios was just a bit too weak to properly fulfill that strong breaker slot that's necessary on this sort of sand balance - and while we're on the topic of balance, this team just struggles versus balance mostly because you're not really able to reliably break past a lot of the sturdier mons such as Skarmory, Buzzwole, and Sludge Tangrowth without having to resort to misplays given that relies too heavily on Rrillaboom + Excadrill to pressure these builds, which I don't really think is ideal given that you are working with a build that generally needs to keep up the offensive pressure against opposing balances.

Last thing I'll say about this build is that I really dislike how slow the team is; it's not a dealbreaker by any means given that you've got enough speed control, but I personally prefer having the immediate options vs generally fast mons like Tapu Koko, Spectrier, and Cinderace. without relying too heavily on one mon to pressure them offensively for reliability's sake but again, that's just personal preference. That aside, this is how I've used your team:

>

Like I've said, I really didn't find Moltres particularly useful on this build, so I ended up replacing it with Buzzwole given that it covered off the huge Urshifu and SD Grounds weakness, but it also covers off on basically everything that Moltres checked, minus Heatran and Magearna arguably a lot more reliably - Ferrothorn, Rillaboom, and Kartana can't make progress as easily, while SD Bulu and Zarude can't really make progress whatsoever. It also helps just generally having a backup check to a lot of the bigger rain threats such as Barraskewda, Crawdaunt, and Rapid Strike to a lesser extent, given that it takes a lot of pressure off of Azumarill, which can also be easily abused by stuff like BU Rapid Strike and SD Crawdaunt anyways, so it's just generally nice to have that secondary option. I've gone with Toxic here given that you're able to punish really greedy Slowbro, Zapdos, and Moltres which generally want to pivot into Buzzwole, but it can also be used to lure in Clefable and Mandibuzz to be punished by....

>

Dragapult, which coincidentally happens to solve two of the team's biggest issues: lack of natural speed and an alternative measure to pressure the top-heavy mons that check both Excadrill and Rillaboom - and on that note, it removes a lot of pressure from both as it gives you a reliable method to revenge kill Spectrier and Cinderace. Dragapult's synergy with the two mons goes beyond that: you're also able to pressure shared checks to the offensive duo in Mandibuzz, Tapu Fini, and Zarude which also naturally just opens up a lot of opportunities for both mons to easily clean. Similarly, it also adds some solid defensive options to the team, as it's able to pivot into AV Glowking with Future Sight and can even afford to pivot into Moltres, Zapdos and Cinderace if it's healthy. Now I should probably explain the oddly specific EVs: the HP and Defence investment allows Dragapult to live an Adamant Cinderace Sucker Punch from full, avoid the 2hko from Rillaboom's Grassy Glide from full, and survive a Clefable / Tapu Fini's Moonblast after a round of Stealth Rock damage. I've also opted to run Thunder in the paste as it 2hko's Mandibuzz, Corviknight, and Tapu Fini, but you're more than welcome to run Shadow Ball if you want a consistent damage option + a move to ohko Spectrier with.


As for some smaller changes, I'd recommend running Leftovers on Excadrill, given that you're able to come in and constantly abuse Clefable and actually afford to pivot into Magearna without remaining low throughout the remainder of the game. I've also opted to run Rock Slide + Rapid Spin on Excadrill as you're able to punish a lot of your shared checks w/ Rillaboom's in Mandibuzz, Zapdos, and Moltres which just saves you a considerable amount of hassle w/ contact moves. Rillaboom now rocks U-turn over Stomping Tantrum as Tantrum was unnecessary and giving mons free turns is much more beneficial in general. Lastly, Tyranitar now runs Rock Blast / Earthquake / Thunder Wave alongside 40 speed EVs, as Earthquake hits Melmetal, Heatran, and Glowking in the one slot, while Thunder Wave is generally nice to run alongside basically, as you can effectively cripple Clefable, Corviknight, and Urshifu to be taken advantage of by the rest of the team. While this isn't in the import, Knock Off and Toxic are both solid options over Draining Kiss which isn't as necessary now the team has an alternative Urshifu check although that didn't really stop me from using Draining Kiss anyways since it's actually pretty funny to watch, but again, it's entirely up to you.



importable


======

>

Let me preface this now: this is an entirely optional change (as optional as a suggestion can be ) but I personally enjoyed running Tornadus as an option over Rillaboom. As I've mentioned earlier, I personally preferred having a generally faster team since it makes playing around offensive mons like Urshifu, Rillaboom, Kartana, and Cinderace a lot more manageable, but again, that's entirely a personal thing for me. That aside, I personally enjoyed having the ability to forcibly remove Zapdos without having to worry about Static contact or being able to break past Corviknight without having to flinch your way through it, although it does come at the cost of the absurdly good rain matchup. If you're concerned about the consequences of losing Rillaboom and how that affects Azumarill, after around 5-6 games of playing without it, I can still say it's absolutely huge given that you're able to trap quite a lot of mons (I ended up forcibly trapping a cm spectrier, tapu fini, melmetal, and a specs kyurem while using the torn version) that benefit the entire team so I can assure you the original idea is still in tact, but I hope you give it a try anyways.


alternate importable

=====

And that should cover just about everything, although I should probably give you a fare warning that I've made the Melmetal matchup considerably more difficult, but it should be manageable! If you have any questions, feel free to pm me on the forums or on discord @ curi#3022 and I'd be happy to answer them. Have a happy holidays and a safe new year.

Thank you for your suggestions! Everything you said sounds reasonable so I will gladly try it out. Weather Ball Rock is something I've never thought of, I'll definitely try the alternate team and let you know how it went!
Although I would think Shadow Ball is a move you want to have on Pult because you may not be able to status the horse or any opponent for that matter and it's a very spammable move. In the Rillaboom version of the team, I wouldn't give earthquake to tyranitar because of grassy terrain, while in the tornadus version I would probably go for heavy duty boots because I don't like taking stealth rock on top of life orb recoil and sandstorm damage. Other than that, it's all good! Let's see how these changes work!